Trump's Big Tech Fascism: Will Secret Algorithms Control Democracy?

Donald Trump is unleashing a Big Tech authoritarianism that could see the richest people in the world getting even more control over Democracy. MORE FROM THOM 📃 Thom's Hartmann's 'Daily Take' Newsletter: https://HartmannReport.com 🎦 Watch a full program re-run anytime: https://www.patreon.com/thomhartmann 🎧 Audio Podcast: https://thom.tv FOLLOW THOM 📕 AMAZON: https://amzn.to/2hS4UwY 📝 DAILY TAKE: https://hartmannreport.com 👥 FACEBOOK: https://www.facebook.com/ThomHartmannProgram/ 📸 INSTAGRAM: https://www.instagram.com/Thom_Hartmann 🎦 PATREON: https://www.patreon.com/thomhartmann 🐦 X: https://www.twitter.com/thom_hartmann Bluesky: https://bsky.app/profile/hartmannreport.com 🌐 WEBSITE: https://www.thomhartmann.com 📺 YOUTUBE: https://www.youtube.com/subscription_center?add_user=thomhartmann 👕 Merchandise: https://teespring.com/stores/thom-hartmann-program-2 🍺 Thom Merchandise: https://teespring.com/thom-hartmann-mug?pid=522&cid=101870 ABOUT THE PROGRAM The Thom Hartmann Program is the leading progressive political talk radio show for political news and comments about Government politics, be it Liberal or Conservative, plus special guests and callers. #MoreFromThom ✔ Amazon links are affiliate links TRANSCRIPT Caller Dion: The inauguration and all this Trump euphoria is going to disappear because it’s going to be back to business for the establishment. Joe Biden said something about a "techno-industrial complex" in his farewell speech, and I think it parallels Eisenhower’s "military-industrial complex." What do you think he meant by the "tech-industrial complex"? Thom: I think what’s happened here, Dion, is that the tech bros—basically Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and friends—have amassed so much power by controlling platforms that almost half of Americans now get most of their news from. They’ve amassed so much power that the Republican Party, and probably a number of Democrats as well, live in fear of them. They’re going to get whatever they want. Trump has the ability to invite a few VIPs to sit in a special place when he gets sworn in, and typically it’s foreign heads of state. He’s going to have four billionaires up there. Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, and— I forget who the other two are—but he’s going to have four billionaires up there. Two of them are media billionaires. And of course, there’s the Murdoch family. I’m not sure if they’ll be there; I doubt it. But yeah, this is the new mainstream media. It’s the new mainstream media now—Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg. Meta just laid off workers, calling them "low performers." And I think Elon’s strategy to eliminate government is to replace it with AI and robots. Well, he’s talked about it. Actually, I can’t say specifically Elon Musk, but there’s a lot of talk in those circles about technocracy—this new form of government that’s all the rage in Silicon Valley. In fact, they’re trying to build a technocratic city in California—or at least they were. There was a lot of talk about it, and they raised some money for it. Basically, the idea is that the government would be run by a small group of very powerful engineers and geniuses who understand technology and can use it to make the world a better place. This becomes the north star of government. I think it’s frankly somewhere between bizarre and dangerous. Dion: Dystopian. Thom: Dangerous, yeah. Dystopian is an excellent phrase for it, Dion. So, we’ll see how it plays out. An awful lot is going to depend on the pushback. We had a period of oligarchy in the United States from 1920 or 1921, with the election of Warren Harding, right up until 1932 with the election of FDR. The oligarchs crashed the economy, and that was the Republican Great Depression, which then brought a pro-democracy response that brought in Franklin Roosevelt. Will that cycle be repeated over the next four years? I think so. I suspect there’s a good chance of it. But we’ll have to wait and see. Dion, great question. Thank you for the call.